A Goal within Reach: Ending the Institutionalization of Children to Ensure No One is Left Behind

Lumos

This report from Lumos defines the global problem of institutionalization of children - including the factors that drive it and the harmful impacts it has on children's physical and cognitive development - and proposes global solutions in line with the Sustainable Development Goals.

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Participatory Peer Research in the Treatment of Young Adults With Mild Intellectual Disabilities and Severe Behavioral Problems

Louis Tavecchio, Peer Van der Helm, Xavier Moonen, Mark Assink, Geert Jan Stams, Inge Wissink, Jessica Asscher - New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development

This study provides an illustration of a research design complementary to randomized controlled trial to evaluate program effects, namely, participatory peer research (PPR). The PPR described in current study was carried out in a small sample (N = 10) of young adults with mild intellectual disabilities (MID) and severe behavioral problems [in residential care in the Netherlands].

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Supporting Governments to Successfully Transition from Institutional to Family-Based Care

Care for Children

This report provides a summary of research methodology and details of meetings and data collection from an October 2017 research visit to understand the current child welfare system in Cambodia, in particular the role and function of the Government residential care institutions (RCIs). The report presents findings and recommendations for pathways forward for government-led foster care development.

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Utilising genetically informed research designs to better understand family processes and child development: implications for adoption and foster care focused interventions

Ruth Sellers, Amelia Smith, Leslie D Leve, Elizabeth Nixon, Jackie Cassell, Gordon Harold - Adoption & Fostering

This article summarises how genetically informed research designs can help disentangle genetic from environmental processes underlying psychopathology outcomes for children, and how this evidence can provide improved insights into the development of more effective preventive intervention targets for adoptive and foster families.

Looked after and adopted children: applying the latest science to complex biopsychosocial formulations

Carmen Pinto - Adoption & Fostering

Looked after and adopted children are among the most vulnerable in our society and it is well established that they present with a higher prevalence of mental health problems than children who live with their birth family. This article presents a case study of a 15-year-old boy whose severe difficulties were understood and formulated in terms of ‘attachment problems’ for many years.

Commonwealth Modern Slavery Act 2018: Guidance for Reporting Entities

Australian Border Force

This guidance, which was developed for businesses and other organisations required to report under Australia's Modern Slavery Act 2018, offers a case study on orphanage trafficking as well as information on orphanage trafficking as a form of modern slavery and how entities can identify it in their operations and supply chains.

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‘If only I had known – I would have done anything to keep my baby’. Assumption of care at birth, who's story is it?

Christine Marsh - Women and Birth

Removal of a baby from his or her mother at the time of birth, when child protection issues are suspected, is know as an Assumption of Care (AoC). This research explored childbearing women's experiences of an AoC at birth. It sought to understand individual women's stories, how they made sense of of the experiences and how these experiences framed their lives.

Examining the relationship between the needs of children and young persons living in residential care and critical incidents using the Singapore CANS assessment tool

Grace S. Chng, Wan Fen Yip, Lydia Pek, Ming Hwa Ting, Chi Meng Chu - Developmental Child Welfare

This study had two aims: first, it sought to test whether Children and young persons (CYPs) who entered residential care with higher level-of-care (LoC) scores on the Child and Adolescent Needs and Strengths (CANS) tool, indicative of higher needs or more intensive services required, were more likely to experience a critical incident. Second, it aimed to test the various needs separately with the occurrence of critical incidents to delineate the impact of each individual need on critical incident.

A narrative review of stability and change in the mental health of children who grow up in family-based out-of-home care

Michael Tarren-Sweeney, Anouk Goemans - Developmental Child Welfare

The present review sought to address the following questions: What evidence is there that long-term, family-based out-of-home care (OOHC) has a general, population-wide effect on children’s mental health such that it is generally reparative or generally harmful? Does entry into long-term OOHC affect children’s mental health, as evidenced by prospective changes over the first years in care? And, is the reparative potential of long-term, family-based OOHC moderated by children’s age at entry into care?

Youth participation in policy advocacy: Examination of a multi-state former and current foster care youth coalition

Astraea Augsberger, Julie Sweeney Springwater, Grace Hilliard Koshinsky, Kelsey Barber, Linda Sprague Martinez - Children and Youth Services Review

This study examined stakeholder views on the key elements and challenges of youth participation in policy advocacy in the context of a US multi-state current and former foster care youth coalition.

Caregiver ratings of executive functions among foster children in middle childhood: Associations with early adversity and school adjustment

Pablo Carrera, Jesús M. Jiménez-Morago, Maite Román, Esperanza León - Children and Youth Services Review

This study sought to analyze the executive functions of a sample of 43 Spanish foster children aged between five and nine years (M = 7.51, SD = 1.29), using a caregiver-reported questionnaire.

Enhancing Capacity for Trauma‐informed Care in Child Welfare: Impact of a Statewide Systems Change Initiative

Christian M. Connell, Jason M. Lang, Bethany Zorba, Kristina Stevens - Community Psychology

This article describes CONCEPT, a multi‐year initiative to enhance capacity of the US state of Connecticut's child welfare system (CWS) to provide trauma‐informed care.

Development of atypical parental behavior during an inpatient family preservation intervention program

Anne-Fleur W. K. Vischer, Wendy J. Post, Hans Grietens, Erik J. Knorth, Elisa Bronfman - Infant Mental Health Journal

Since failed reunification is a detrimental outcome for children, particularly infants and toddlers, the aim of this study was to gain insight into support to families in multiple-problem situations in the Netherlands to help them achieve sustainable good-enough parenting.

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Maintaining culture and supporting cultural identity in foster care placements

Manjula Waniganayake, Fay Hadley, Matthew Johnson, Paul Mortimer, Tadgh McMahon, Kathy Karatasas - Australasian Journal of Early Childhood

This article reports on an exploratory study about maintaining and supporting the cultural identity of children from culturally and linguistically diverse family backgrounds in foster care placements.

Conceptions, Norms, and Values in the Work of Child Protective Services with Families at Risk: An Analysis of Social Workers’ Diaries

Annelie Björkhagen Turesson - Clinical Social Work Journal

This study is based on diaries maintained by three social workers in relation to 15 families that were the subject of interventions by the child protective services in Sweden.

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Attorney Perspectives of Child Protective Services “Legal Kidnapping”

Daniel Pollack - Yeshiva Academic Institutional Repository

For this legal note, four experienced attorneys who have litigated many child protection cases were asked about the alleged overreaching that US Child Protective Services (CPS) effectuates by improperly removing a child from its parent(s), seemingly without sufficient cause.

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Health needs of refugee children identified on arrival in reception countries: a systematic review and metaanalysis

Albertine Baauw, Joana Kist-van Holthe, Bridget Slattery, Martijn Heymans, Mai Chinapaw, Hans van Goudoever - BMJ Paediatrics Open

The authors of this article aimed to perform a systematic review of the literature to describe the health status of refugee children on entering reception countries in Europe.

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Young Children in Institutional Care: Characteristics of Institutions, Children’s Development, and Interventions in Institutions

Megan M. Julian, Junlei Li, Annie Wright, Pamela A. Jimenez-Etcheverria - Children’s Social Worlds in Cultural Context

In this article, institutions in Russia, China, Ghana, and Chile are described with reference to the circumstances that lead to children’s institutionalization, resident children’s social-emotional relationships, and unique characteristics of each country’s institutional care (e.g., volunteer tourism in Ghana, and shifting demographics of institutionalized children in China).

Is Poverty Eroding Parental Rights in Britain? The Case of Child Protection in the Early Twenty-First Century

Alicia-Dorothy Mornington & Alexandrine Guyard-Nedelec - Philosophy and Child Poverty

This chapter argues that poverty per se should never constitute the basis for removing children from their parents and seeks to understand the British situation, in order to see how poverty is treated in relation to child welfare in Britain.

The Interface of Child Welfare and Parental Criminal Justice Involvement: Policy and Practice Implications for the Children of Incarcerated Parents

Benjamin de Haan, Joseph A. Mienko, J. Mark Eddy - Handbook on Children with Incarcerated Parents

This article presents the perspectives of three authors - who have collective experience in administration, practice, and research in both systems - on the interaction between the adult corrections system and the child welfare system in the USA and the implications of this interaction for children with incarcerated parents.

Improving decision-making agreement in child protection cases by using information regarding parents' response to an intervention: A vignette study

Sabinevan der Asdonk, et al - Children and Youth Services Review

This study investigated whether information regarding parents' response to an attachment-based intervention impacted placement decisions and agreement among decision makers.